Fairchild Republic OA-10A Thunderbolt II
Same Warthog, new job — the airborne forward air controller that marks targets with smoke rockets · Redesignated 1987 · Upgraded to A-10C by 2011
From 1987 a number of A-10As were moved into the forward air control (FAC) role and redesignated OA-10A. The aircraft themselves were not modified: an OA-10A is an A-10A with a different mission, flown by pilots who locate targets, mark them with smoke or white-phosphorus rockets and direct other attack aircraft onto them. The 23rd Tactical Air Support Squadron at Davis-Monthan, previously equipped with the OA-37 Dragonfly, was the first squadron to convert.
Because nothing had been removed, OA-10As stayed fully combat capable and often flew alongside A-10As in mixed units. They served in the 1991 Gulf War, where battle-damaged A-10s and OA-10As were among the aircraft written off, and in Iraq in 2003, where sixty A-10s and OA-10s took part in the opening phase of the campaign.
The separate designation faded out when the whole fleet of 356 A-10s and OA-10s went through the Precision Engagement upgrade between 2005 and 2011 and became A-10Cs. Preserved OA-10As include 80-0186 at the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum in McMinnville, Oregon.
